May-6-2019-Regular-Board-Meeting-Segment-3
[00:00:00] But if you are here and especially if your principal who's been sitting here waiting we welcome you and grab something to eat. Nobody's listening to me.
We do appreciate the extra time that you took to be here tonight, and I am going to turn it over to dr. Spencer Iams and Doctor prior to talk about the positive classrooms and social-emotional learning update.
[00:01:00] Thank you so much chair Fitch and board members to have a little time to come and speak with you about the incredibly comprehensive and complex work that we are all involved within leading for all in our schools. And as you saw or as you referenced chair Fitch. And like try and there you go. We were really thinking about in creating learning communities.
We create learning communities by involving everyone in the community. It really takes all of us to reach this goal and it's in a question statement because we're never quite there. We're always in process. It's imperfect. It's very human work and. We've heard from families who have had some really difficult times or heard some really difficult stories that are really important and it's really important that we hear those [00:02:00] and we learn from those and we continue to get better and it's with deep respect that we always reach out and try to find out how to help those individual situations and we're going to share some of the proactive work that we're doing some of our beliefs and some of our practices that are moving us forward as a district imperfectly.
It is but in a very positive direction.
So when we developed a framework, we called it the inclusive and Equitable schools framework. And so we thought it would be important to Define. What do we mean by inclusive and Equitable because those are terms that are used by a lot of people and they often meet a lot of things and so here are four of the points that we mean when we talk about that we mean that.
Unlike some other that we are committed that every student should be able to attend their neighborhood school that we should bring the resources and supports to them rather than making them go somewhere [00:03:00] else to get the resources and supports they need to be successful. We do of course have some family choice and I would also be remiss if I didn't say we do have a very a handful of students that are an IEP team may have made a decision that because of a significant mental health need maybe at a setting outside of our school district for a short period of time.
But by and large all of our students are attending their neighborhood schools. It's not just attending. We are committed that every student has a sense of belonging. I think mrs. Miller actually mentioned that the longing in their classroom community and not just a sense of belonging but also has access to the general education learning and curriculum.
In our most high leverage work that happens in terms of learning is done in the general education classroom. That's where the real action is. That's where the [00:04:00] learning happens and some students may have individualized schedules or supports because it's not one size fits all and so we have teams that can create differentiation or individualized approaches as needed.
I preach appreciated that Equity picture if you don't mind. I'm just a little bit of a different way to look at it. But still that same piece of we're not we all need to be able to access that Apple, but we might do it in some different ways.
Well, like, excuse me, dr. Spencer. I wanted to just start off by expressing my appreciation for the opportunity to talk about the work that our school leaders have been doing I feel like it's some of the most exciting world-changing work that we do and it a particularly exciting because. The work that we do to help students experience positive productive school days is highly aligned with the work that we do in mathematics and literacy [00:05:00] in art where you know, we use this all some few model the model.
Inherently expresses a strong belief that that all students can learn and you know, the purpose of school is to learn and that not only around math, but it's around how we treat each other how we learn our internal emotional state what we do when we become dysregulated and you know, everyone in this room has to become dysregulated at some point and I think taking on that that's just a standard that something that we all go through especially when school.
Often creates a situation where we have to have that skill you think of, you know until you come to school. You might not have had to justify your mathematical reasoning or negotiate your way through a problem playing tag at recess. So it makes sense that all students would need to learn these skills around how to get along and treat each other safely and respectfully and then I think it's also important to notice that you [00:06:00] know, because we all go through this students are constantly moving.
Through these different zones of all some few and you're one of the examples that dr. Spencer and items were versatile reminiscing about for our times in schools is that we were called that oftentimes the students first entered our district whether that's through kindergarten or other grades, there might have been a period of transition where they were learning our culture our they were learning some particular skills and they made it made it needed a lot of attention and support.
And then as they move down through the grades without intentionally doing this weed often forget about them because we would move on to the next group you need is support and then we would see them in the hall and say God. I remember we used to spend a lot of time together. You're just doing so great.
And that's that's just a natural like the same. That's the connection back to mathematics or reading we go through periods where we might need some extra help and then if we're successful will slip back into that that all Zoom so we just want to recognize that this is a familiar. We know you're at the board where you're familiar with the awesome few and it aligns highly with our work around inclusive [00:07:00] classroom communities.
Anything that you know is from being board members is that the work is complex and what we're talking about is not just a single training or hiring one person to be in charge of helping schools. Be safe respectful places, but it's the work of everyone and this is one graphic that kind of captures.
Do one lance the totality of the work expresses that it's important to think about planning and learning around beliefs practices and structures and all three of those components need to be strongly in place for us to have success. You could I was just reminiscing back to where we started feeling the need to be have stronger practices for teaching social emotional learning.
And how everything changed when we bought a social emotional learning curriculum for every classroom that allowed that belief to actually take shape and practice because everyone had access to the resources and best practices grew across so and [00:08:00] then the other part that's important to remember that connects back to other academic areas.
It's just a strong belief that every child comes to school wanting to be their best self and is their best. And that that just like they can learn anything. They can also learn new skills for treating each other compassionately and safely.
So when we think about the beliefs that guide our work with all children, these are some of the core ones everyone belongs and each child is important. All of our students will do well if they can. We have a belief. This is an interesting one that behavior is a communication and when a student might be experiencing a difficult patch.
They're trying to tell us something and it's our job as Educators to sleuth out. You know, what is it that they need to be successful. They might be young and not able to communicate it yet. They might not just have learned, you know how to understand that that particular feeling and how [00:09:00] to express the need for the skills.
That would help. Work through it. So that goes back to the next bullet. We look for the why behind the behavior we teach personal accountability. We believe strongly in the power of peers. We know that school and learning is a social Endeavor and that when the community is working on it together.
That's when we can hold ourselves accountable and accelerate learning in a very positive way. We know that every student comes to school with a strong repertoire of strengths and our job is to look for those drinks and build upon them. That the mindset of both students and Educators matters and we pay really close attention to the language we use because it might be a key that we need to check our own biases and beliefs and it's also a way of expressing in many subtle and total ways our belief in children that they can be successful.
And then we also believe learning social social emotional skills is some of the most important work of schools.
[00:10:00] So there are we're fortunate in that there's a really strong body of research around what makes a difference for promoting positive School climate and for reducing negative or unsafe behavior in schools. And what I appreciate about this particular graphic that dr. Spencer items located is it it puts increased academic engagement right on the.
One of the things that we're learning is when behaviors not might not yet be where we'd like them to be. The first thing we look at is the student appropriately engaged are they excited to come to school do they have worked that connects to their interest if they're ready to dig into and then if we move sort of counterclockwise through that graphic we think about how as we mentioned earlier just not one particular aspect of school culture is going to bring about the very best in everyone.
So we need to have a strong coherent integrated approach. I think around the schools where they have some really clearly defined beliefs and behaviors that they [00:11:00] stand for. They express those in morning meeting. They celebrate students who show it they reinforce it when they see it and they're they have a really common cohesive set of language that students can unpack in and understand through different levels of complexity.
We're learning as you'll see in a little bit to you better use data to understand the impact of our teaching and practices and how to adjust and we're High leverage points for adjustment might live. We believe in powering students because ultimately they're the owners of their choices and helping using an opportunity to be a learning opportunity.
So that next time they can make a stronger more safe choice. And then all these things come together to help us decrease reactive management. We do know that sometimes we've got to step in for safety purposes to help a child, but we always do that through the lens of how am I going to help that student do better next time and that might be a particular one-on-one interaction or might be a [00:12:00] look at the whole system that helps not only helps us learn not only how to support that student but other children in the school.
So as we're thinking about that the practices that we are thinking about for all students and one of the ways that dr. Pryor was talking about having really a coherent approach and of coherence is something we've spent a lot of time thinking about as a district because getting a prescription of what to do at West Linn High School would not necessarily make sense.
At Trillium Creek Primary School, right but a framework can give us a coherent approach. What are the big ideas that we believe will make a difference around student Behavior student engagement student learning across all of those so that we can have those things in place. So as students rise through our levels of schooling it's not a [00:13:00] totally different set of expectations or true teaching strategies as we go from primary school to Middle.
High school and I just have to call out the amazing work of our building principals many of whom are here that are really on the, you know, just leading this work every single day in our buildings in so many ways and they really bring these Frameworks to life in the work that they're doing. So you're familiar likely with the framework that is in small print that you absolutely cannot read, but you can if you know it you might reference.
The left which is the five dimensions of teaching and learning and that has been our district-wide instructional framework for the last seven eight years, I believe and we'd be happy to get you additional copies of that and talks a lot about planning and having strong purpose in our lessons and engagement strategies and how to use assessment to inform [00:14:00] teaching all those sorts of things and the last dimension in there was about classroom culture and environment.
Mint and a little bit about behavior and as we were on this journey and many teachers were saying hey, I'm all in but I need a little more specifics about how to do this work. We kind of took that Fifth Dimension and blew it up and sort of created our own framework very much about what are we striving towards?
What are the big ideas that need to be in place in every classroom Community one of the things we always need to think about that are most high leverage and that's where we. This seven components that inclusive and Equitable classrooms framework. The one that has those sort of round bubbles there.
You'll see a poster on the wall as well. So I'm going to take a minute and highlight each of those with us and kind of bring that to light first of all. This framework comes based on taking the best of a lot of best practices. [00:15:00] We had a really great exercise last year with our school counselors where we took this framework and we crosswalked it with trauma-informed schools practices, and we cross walked it with zareta Hammonds.
Culturally responsive ready for rigor framework and we crosswalked it with school-wide positive behavior interventions and support practices. And really these are the big ideas that across all of those always come out so we know these are very high leverage. So one of the most important ones and this will come note as no surprise to you and again and Teacher Appreciation Week relationships with high expectations.
Is absolutely one of the most high leverage things in creating a classroom culture and environment and when we think about. All students every single student in that classroom having that strong relationship with that teacher and there are some amazing teachers here in our audience who I've seen [00:16:00] establish those relationships in so many ways.
Sometimes it's little ways. It's those greetings at the door. It's sometimes it's a deep conversation. Sometimes it's coming back. I heard about a teacher last week who was really having a difficult time with a student and the principal had asked that teacher a question and said, How's your relationship?
It must be hard when you kind of had this he's having he's been displaying some behaviors that have not been super positive. And so how is it going with your relationship and she goes yeah, that's not been good. And so after that prompt from the principal she connected with the family and anyway found out he'd never been to the zoo.
And so she brought this whole virtual Zoo thing and spent the. His next lunch period invited him to come to you like a virtual Zoo walk with her and it was quite lovely and was you know, I don't know if that changed everything but it's part of that ongoing we have to have those strong relationships and [00:17:00] keep those high expectations.
So just like with reading we would never say well gosh. Sorry you didn't you came in with low reading skills. So. Not going to be much of a reader. It's the same thing with social emotional skills. We might have some kids that come to us that their skill level at managing their emotions or processing problem solving might not be quite where we want it to be yet.
And so we have to keep those high expectations and support them through that. Well, I'll just on the yellow bubble right under that one. Dr. Pryor was talking about engagement strategies, and I'm not going to spend a lot of time on that because that's really all the things we do to engage. Age students in the academic learning of the classroom just a big shout-out to dr.
Swanson in in really making sure that's infused in all of the professional learning development that we do with teachers is a now it's always taking that for all how are we thinking about mathematics for all Learners how we're thinking about social studies for all Learners? We really thinking a lot about [00:18:00] Universal Design for Learning where we know that as we plan a lesson.
There's going to be different. Is that some students need to engage in that material some students might need a different access points some students might need a different way to show their learning and that's okay the ideas that got to get the learning. So it's very exciting to see the work that is continuing to develop their when we talk about rituals routines and recognition critically important and for some students if the classroom is not particularly no is.
Predictable most students will be fine with that. But for some students that might be just the absolutely the difference whether or not they'll be successful in that classroom. So one of the things that we think about if we're as we're setting up our classrooms, how do we have that level of predictability that's not boring but it's not that gives comfort and reduces anxiety [00:19:00] for students who get very anxious when things might be different.
Use of effective physical spaces being out. We took a group of visitors from Hermiston School District out two weeks ago when we were visiting at Wilsonville high school and just saw some beautiful examples of. High school classroom spaces just being organized in different ways. I'm not the traditional Rose and but groupings and different kinds of seating spaces and comfortable places and it really makes a difference to students ability to be fully present to be comfortable and what's effective for one student might not be effective for another so sometimes we have to shift things and that's one of the things that our teachers have been looking at as we think about.
Teaching common expectations and you notice it doesn't say having common expectations but teaching them because [00:20:00] it's it's one thing we have to have them and then we also have to gosh I need to learn that one again. And it's always in that sense of again a kids will do well if they can okay, let's go back and reteach and then teaching those social emotional skills.
One of the things that's in your packets are lots of reference. For all of these things many of these. Well, there's a lot of materials. I'll get to that later. What I would I the one I didn't mention was restorative practices because I thought why should I talk about that when I could get the fabulous?
Classroom teacher from Beckman Creek Jen aren't who does this so beautifully to come up and share a little bit about her experience around restorative practices and how she uses those in her classroom. So Jen. Thank you for coming up.  I
want to start by thanking the [00:21:00] board for being here and supporting teachers for teacher appreciation week and every other. Night that you're here working hard. We feel your support truly. So thank you and also share how awestruck I am by my leaders here in this school district and what a big opportunity this is for me to get to learn from dr.
Ludwig. Dr. Spencer Iams.  all of our leaders here. Thank you. It's really really an inspiring place to work.  I want to start with they gave me some Billet bullet points of some pointers to talk about in my classroom.  The bottom one speaks to different levels of support need that. Our students have and the way that we work with our Specialists to [00:22:00] accomplish these goals for our students and in an older model, we had students leave the classroom to get what they needed.
They go out over here and get what they needed. They go out over there and get what they needed. They might get. Help from a special ed teacher or a resource room teacher and then they would come back to our classroom for Gen ed class when I was at home base, and I so appreciate Tammy's story of Ellie getting to be in her classroom her gen Ed classroom and a member of that.
Community all the time and that has been where I have been able to make the strongest relationships with students is when they are in my room all the time and I'm not off the hook for our relationship and they're not off the hook and but what I mean by that is that we're committed to each other's success.
I as a teacher believe that one of our strongest teachers is our environment and our experiences [00:23:00] and. Having opportunities to experience self-efficacy by. Achieving small accomplishments is the only way that children see that they have self-worth and that they will grow as individuals. So with the work of our special ed teams with our Administration, I feel supported by the expertise and the room and that ability for us to come together and really think what is it?
That's. I'm going to be best for this child. And how are we going to reach them? And I would say that I've had really phenomenal teachers a little background about me. I grew up in this school district. I went to Stafford and AP Creek and Wilsonville right when it opened. They were still sweeping up the construction dust when I walked in it was beautiful school and but my very best teachers are my students and the experiences that I've [00:24:00] had with them.
So. Briefly as brief as I can be I wanted to share some of the things they've taught me by bringing their voice here and restorative practices involves a shift in our thinking that. If you think of times when you've been influenced by a leader, it's when someone did something with you not to you.
So you've made a mistake and they've said how can I help you? Restore this to make it right? I know you didn't want to make this mistake and how can we fix this together? So that's the foundation and realist the shortest words I can place it. In solving problems. So the shift is instead of saying why did you do that?
Why did you do that which we've all done which and [00:25:00] initiative naturally promotes shame and embarrassment and makes it really hard to learn if you're embarrassed. We shift to say what happened and. How are you feeling and thinking at the time when this event happened this mistake that you've made and what do you think and feel about it now that you've had time to think about it?
And how did this affect other people? So as a kindergarten and first grade teacher in Corvallis, I was I think 23 when the life touches lady came in. She said where's the teacher to me as a brand new teacher said, it's me. I noticed my students needed a lot of support when it came to coming in from the playground.
They needed that a lot of problems a lot of things happen to them out there. And so I quickly learned that the circle was a place to solve a lot of our problems. We were already meeting in [00:26:00] circles. It was a time to be together to have Equity of voice to be sincere to be heard and to be valued. And so I developed a way to solve problems that I think mirrors the work of restorative practices my class chooses to leave names out when we solve problems as a group there's times when we need to take.
Care of things in smaller spaces, but in public spaces, we solve things without using names. So I had a little girl I decided to name her Jen. I haven't met any Jen's coming into school lately that name seems to have moved on. She she came to school with a lot of baggage that was slowing her down as a learner and making it hard for me to connect with their peers.
She came from a family that was struggling with money. With two really hard-working parents. She didn't always have time to be [00:27:00] clean for school. Her clothes also didn't fit quite right because she was a bit overweight and she let me know that no one was playing with her at our school. And she was in the second grade and this one seems obvious, right?
We need to connect her with her peers and get her some friends and my early in my early years. I might have connected her immediately and made her a little friend and center right off to recess but we were systematically excluding this child from our classroom. I when I looked around it was happening in.
All sorts of places in our classroom even with my creative pair shares and things to overcome that so.  We talked to the class and after hearing this you could feel.  When she was given the voice to share how she felt it that feeling washed over the class.  And it wasn't just one kid that needed to [00:28:00] hear it.
We all needed to hear this and. Naturally, we gave her some feedback. We not naturally we have a system for this we said how did this make you feel?
How can we make this right with you? And when it came to the place where we might solve the problem the kids beat me to it and they said someone they said well, what do you like to do at recess and she said well, I really liked to push the swing at the tire the tire swing and the eyes lit up around the room and they said we've got a place for that.
We need up a tire swing Pusher and I wouldn't say we fixed that child Story by any means but I bring the story up as briefly as I can because. She benefited in that moment, but I would argue that the we benefited from her story and that moment really deeply to know her perspective. And if you might humor me for another brief story, I [00:29:00] think story is a good way to learn.
I had a spirited child recently come in from the playground and say hey. At the next recess let's target John.  In the game that we are playing with the ball and I bring this up because there are my first story was it's obvious to me that we should help the little girl. I named Jen but this little boy said let's target.
This other child in the game make sure they get out every time and a potential by standard is what I'm naming this other little boy. He's he didn't have a chance to. To respond because they both saw that I had heard and our eyes all kind of looked at each other and that Mona moment of pause like what she gonna do now.
She heard us say that and naturally the part of me that [00:30:00] is not the restorative practices part that says I have to stop this I have to change this as quickly and swiftly as possibly this cannot take place in our schools. I was thinking of what I might say my lecture all the things I knew that would prevent this from happening and then I paused and thought who should solve this.
And I knew it was the children that needed to solve it that it couldn't just be me in a spirited child in the potential bystander. So we went through our child our process and really briefly. I would like to share with you that we. Listen to the child who had been asked to Target another child. We said what happened?
And he said I was asked to Target another child at recess today and you could feel that same uneasiness settle over.  The classroom and we knew we had done wrong. We had done [00:31:00] something wrong and. There was real risk here in solving this problem. In fact, we I even questioned whether we should solve this problem as a group and I asked the kids should we solve this problem as a group or should this be private and there was nods around the room that said, this is a someone said, this is a worthy problem because it's happened before.
It happens at recess. So we got back to work solving this problem and we asked the child who was the vice the potential by standard the one that had been asked to Target someone we said, what did you feel and he said worried sad might lose a friend and the game isn't fun anymore.  And so we responded.
This is what one child said. I hear you feel worried and sad. I would feel that way too said another child's and yet another said I know we wouldn't want to be targeted and it makes you feel sad because you can [00:32:00] imagine what that other child would feel like if he was targeted another child said, you know, it's not right.
And another said I hope you get helpful feedback today. So we passed and ask this child. How are you feeling now that you've gotten to share that you were asked to Target another child and he said a little better. I think the group understands and agrees and it probably won't happen again.  And you could feel that the shift in energy in this classroom something.
I've added to my work after reading. More of the practices of restorative practices is to imagine the other person's perspective. So we got to our heads together and thought well what might this child be thinking and yet this child is in the room. They they're Anonymous but they're there and he became a little more lightened in his [00:33:00] in his listening, but he had been intently listening all along and children started to offer.
Well, maybe he wants to. Maybe he recognizes that child is being really good at this game, and maybe he wants to get better by getting that child out.  and the more I listened to the children the more I learned that. This idea of targeting another child really came from a place of excitement real excitement for the game and not a place of targeting another child and the children taught me to listen to them and that they are the capable problem solvers.
So if I'd pulled them aside who would have learned.  Would have done the learning and I think I would have done the learning. And this problem might have persisted for weeks and come up and lots of other interesting ways. That would have disrupted our classroom.  One [00:34:00] last bit. I'm a parent in this school district.
I've got two girls that go to Beckman Creek Primary and one of them got her class list this year and said, oh, That kids really challenging that kid in my class is super challenging. I remember when he was in my first grade class.  And then we moved on I didn't say anything about it, but not that long ago that came up that she was working with this child that she was worried about being with and I said, how's that going and to be honest as a parent?
I thought. I hope it's going okay. I'm really concerned and I'd hate for her to have a disrupted classroom environment. But she said ah he's kind of hard to work with but I figured him out and he's really good at math.  And she went on to describe how she manages working with him and she approaches him with a lot of [00:35:00] compassion that her teachers at Beckman Creek have taught her because of the leadership of this.
Room and she has this open-minded perspective of children with diverse abilities and needs and she sees the strengths in others and learns from them and sees their depth of character which I think are phenomenal leadership skills. So I thank you for your work with this.
Jen thank you so much. I just really appreciate that and I'm just going to go right into the next and this is really your slide David, but I'm going to say that first. So how do we support all teachers in learning about these strategies and practices that we've committed to as best practice for all students and there's so many ways and this is just the tip of the iceberg so much of his it of it is the work teachers are doing with each other [00:36:00] peer-to-peer learning.
In so much of it is the work our principles are doing very explicitly and and in a embedded way, but one that's up there that teacher-led inclusive and Equitable classrooms Workshop series that we've done a couple of times as co-taught by General Ed teachers and learning Specialists or special ed instructional coordinators co-teaching on unpacking that framework and Jen you might not be surprised to hear was one of our teacher leaders in leading other teachers with that and she brought in a video.
Of one of her classroom Circles of problem-solving you would not believe the language that the children had learned to solve problems through the approach that she had that will serve would serve many of us well in our board rooms and work environments now, so I'm thank you Jennifer for sharing that.
Well, dr. Spencer, I'm stole one of the most exciting bullets up there. And the one thing that I would just add to what she said is that we've done multiple [00:37:00] rounds of this class and it is. So exciting that it fills up this if you were to come down here during that class you would see more teachers and you could expect in this room because of the strong interest in learning in this area as well as I believe is it a belief in the quality of the program.
So I'm glad that dr. Spencer Rhymes highlighted that these bullets are not comprehensive. They are just some highlights of our work but one of the main points was. We're trying to differentiate the professional learning across the levels and to recognize this drinks at teachers bring and that they have different learning interest in needs depending upon where they're a professionally the needs of their class what they're currently teaching.
And so we have been to move down that list. We've been working with consultants for examples. Skip dr. Skip Greenwood. It's a licensed clinical psychologist who for many years has been helping us learn about best practices and methods for supporting students with [00:38:00] emotional and Behavioral.
Challenges we know principles and instructional coordinators and teachers have led innumerable the small group and whole school unpacking of the Frameworks that dr. Spencer Rhymes has been sharing with us and helping teachers make sense of those and connect it to their own practice. There's been a great deal of enthusiasm over the last year around the three two, one insight parashar and trauma-informed video series, which are like any digital resources.
They all more when teams or individuals have time to access them and they're particularly powerful. I know that there's been great interest amongst our classified employees who come right along side our children currently needing support and they've really appreciated. You want to pick the pair of sharp video that might fit their particular need and they're short highly educational opportunities to increase their Professional Knowledge before they go to work the next day.
As you know, we have Equity teams across the district and [00:39:00] across schools and many school Equity teams have purposely taken on the work of student Behavior. We have coaching that happens from a variety of teacher leaders and instructional coordinators across the district. We've been learning about zones of Regulation from our occupational therapist as well.
As our counselors leading trauma-informed workshops across the district.
And we just wanted to touch base also, just like with any learning Endeavor. We want to get feedback on our work. And the Frameworks that help us get better at supporting positive behavior. They all Point toward the importance of using data to identify where things going. Well and where might you want to focus your professional learning and so we have been piloting and moving forward with a system that helps.
Get better at tracking some of the behavior supports that we've been putting in place in our schools. And as you would imagine it's really [00:40:00] helpful when really quick anecdote that we were just reflecting on was this idea that one of our primary principles was collecting some data around office referrals with back to study that and realize, you know, a lot of these referrals are actually happening over recess.
Dug a little deeper actually first grade recess. So we've moved from with a lot of behavior problems to actually maybe first grade recess and needs a little bit of support got outside to recess and realize it's actually first grade tag. And so that raises questions. Well we can fix tag. You know, we can teach skills to play safely.
We can bring alternative games and resources, but you know, it's a funny example, but it helps it's a really good example of how the data can help you pinpoint your limited time to focus professional learning or support directly on the most need in your school as well as recognize where things are going really really well.
Another principle in responding to some of the news reports around schools dealing with behavior was able to show the parent Community. Actually we're doing really well and this is the exact percentage which is [00:41:00] really small. The number of kids who've been referred more than more than winter twice to the office.
So now we're just going to shift for a little bit to the some and few part of our of our work and this is where we Circle back to dr. Spencer Rhymes discussions around equity in that there are times in school where we need to differentiate the levels of support and what's working for all might not be enough and what I'd like to point out is often.
This is a temporary measure because if we're doing it, well the students. To learn new skills new behaviors and new ways of thinking where they don't need the support for very long. I think it's also important to note a couple of things one is some students come to school that automatically is aligned with their needs.
For example, the teacher may be of the same culture as the student the curriculum may be written to really match that students needs and so sometimes when we think. A student might [00:42:00] need more what we're actually saying is actually they need equal opportunity to their peers in order to thrive in school.
And then as dr. Spencer eyes pointed out earlier research continues to show that when all students thrive. All students Thrive, so this work is not only good for the students who might temporarily fall in that summer few category, but all students benefit when there are less disruptions in their classroom all students benefit when their Partners able to challenge their mathematical thinking and help push them to the next level and we've been referring back to some of the work of dr.
Pedro noguera who actually approaches the work from a sociologist. And he's confirming this research that this work actually is good for all students and accelerates. Not only those who are supporting currently but all students in that setting.
[00:43:00] Thank you, and you'll notice they're the very same beliefs. So we believe the same things about kids whether or not their student that needs a lot of support or needs a little bit of support. So those beliefs are exactly the same and that's really important. And sometimes we have to push ourselves to remind that those are our.
Ifs and I just wanted to say introduce a fabulous partner in the work Tammy and Brad who shared earlier our amazing Partners in our work and I'm going to introduce Janine Pascal to come up now when we talk about partnership and parents and the work that we've done together. In this school district to push ourselves to be more Equitable and inclusive in all of our schools.
We could not be where we are. Now without strong parent voice that has really supported us. Push dust brought us resources made us think linked arms through the tough times and [00:44:00] my they know they're my heroes and this is Janine Pascal and I'll let her take it from here. First I'd like to say thanks for letting me be here tonight.
And I am so excited about everything that I'm seeing and hearing so just know that from a parent's perspective. We feel very blessed to be here in this District right now with the work is going on. So what I want to share with you tonight is just a story that I think illustrates a lot of what has already been talked about.
I'm a parent of three children two of whom are graduates of Western High School. My youngest is currently a sixth grader at Rosemont Ridge Middle School. She experiences disability when she was in kindergarten. She changed schools very late in the school year. So going into first grade. She was still having a bit of butter trouble connecting with her peers.
So this incident happened at recess one day where she was spitting on children recess. So everybody came in from recess and they were all telling the teacher and I was spitting on us so the teacher spoke with Anna and [00:45:00] said did you spit on the kids at recess? And she said yes, I was making it rain on them.
And the teacher said well, you know, why did you think that's okay what made you do that? And she said well my friends liked it. So the teacher said well, why would you think that your friends like that? And she said they were laughing? So the teacher asked some of the other students who are involved to come and talk with them and she said were you know what happened and they said well Anna was standing on the play structure and she was spitting on the people who were below her and the teachers have what did you guys laugh and they said yeah we laugh.
So she said well if you did something in your friends laughed, what would you do? They said we do it again. So she was able to help them see that from Anna's perspective and a my daughter. They were all having fun together. She was making her friends. But what should what this teacher was also able to do was Express to these kids that you know, you don't have to wait to come in from Recess until that this happened.
You can say to her. Hey, I don't like it that you're doing that please stop and it's [00:46:00] okay to approach any peer with those words and then we were able to use that as a learning event for a learning opportunity for my daughter and create some opportunities for her to do some role play around how to to invite children to play in.
More appropriate manner so from my perspective in the stabbing in first grade five years ago and it has stuck with me how wonderfully this was handled at the school district within the school classroom and how it wasn't learning opportunity for every student and to this day. My daughter's peers will say to her.
I don't like it when you do that, please stop and she knows she receives that message. So I guess I'd like to also just say. The importance of inclusion for myself for my family for my daughter. This is her community the same as it's my community and yours and every other student and when we go to the park or to the swimming pool the kids in her class are the kids that we see there and it's so wonderful that they are able to to have an [00:47:00] opportunity to build a relationship with her in school that carries over outside of school.
Let me these are the kids that she plays and. To be in her community even as she grows. These are going to be the people who know her abilities who are going to hire her whenever she's looking for a job. And if I feel indulge me for one more minute, I'd like to give an example of this in action this year.
She's on the track team and she's having a good time. So she's two weeks ago. We were at a meet and she was sitting near the shot point for area waiting for it to be her turn. Just sitting and two girls from AP Creek Middle School. Not even my daughter's school came over sat down next to her introduce themselves asked her name.
Hey, what events are you doing today? Good luck and then continue to sit by her until it was her turn and I think that those kids are learning those lessons. They weren't saying. Oh, we awkward to go approach this girl or we don't know this girl. They're learning that everybody belongs in their community.
So just appreciative of that.
[00:48:00] Thank you so much Janine. And in that story you could see that when we think about the Platte practices and structures. For the sum and the few thank you and really were thinking about the same thing. So we're not it's not that we're thinking about different things but they may have different intensity or differentiation.
So even in that story I could think about engagement strategies. Well, maybe if Anna had had different things to do at recess that she knew what to do. She might not have been in that situation. So that might open one way to problem solve it another way was teaching that social emotional skills that you brought forward, both for Anna.
About perspective taking and for the other students about how to handle that. So I just I think that's a great perspective about that may not have been a lesson all students needed but it's the same components but adopted for the needs of that student at that time. So moving a little faster [00:49:00] here.
In terms of professional development again just the tip of the iceberg but there are all kinds of things that we're doing and these wouldn't necessarily be for all fit all of our staff but different staff working who might be working with different students with different needs. So we've definitely done a number of things around trauma informed practices really building our repertoire around comprehensive functional behavioral assessment and Behavior Support planning collaborative problem-solving.
Nonviolent Crisis Prevention known as CPI star ABA based interventions. Those all might be things that might we might pull upon and provide professional development to help make sure we can meet the needs of all students and again any of these things. If you want to hear more about let us know we'll be happy to come back with more.
So, dr. Pryor talked about the importance of us investing the time and the energy on the proactive part of building Community teaching [00:50:00] skills, inclusive and Equitable classrooms. That is where our that is the high leverage work and we know that's where that our work needs to be and sometimes things happen.
And so that's where are our teachers and our building principals really think through. How do we. And when something happened unexpected or an unsafe incident happens, well, the first thing we always are thinking about is safety. Well, how do we make that spot safe right now for all involved? And then the second thing we're thinking about is what will make it loast most likely to not happen again.
And then how is dignity and Community restored for all and our principles might use a number of different things I can see that shouldn't have been a white font. Sorry. That's my fault. It might be handling it through a circle a teacher might handle something through a circle as Jen aren't just shared with us in a restorative practice or a principal might bring to students together to solve a more serious situation [00:51:00] privately to see how they might solve it, but that's not appropriate.
Everything or it might not be all of it. Sometimes it is going to involve School discipline. Sometimes we might have a very serious incident at a maybe a secondary student who makes it who's so angry they make a threat towards another student and we need to investigate that threat assessment process and we have that in place.
Sometimes we might have where we are a student might be have a special education plan. And so we might bring that IEP team back together and say, What can we do differently? Something's not working here and those that can happen once a year it can happen, you know 15 times in a year and we're going to keep coming back and linking arms as much as needed.
And then I think the trickiest one that we keep hearing about and we keep trying to learn our way into better is what's the communication who needs to know what who needs to know that supports a feeling of safety because sometimes [00:52:00] you give a little bit of information, but you can't give all of. It might actually.
Not give it might make people more worried. It's just know there was spitting on the playground, you know, then to know the whole story, but maybe the story is more of one students private part, you know, so it's it's a tricky thing that our building principals navigate all the time. And I think you know, we've been hearing from our community that if it's a call one way or the other they rather no more then.
And so we're really trying to learn our way through that sometimes principles will send a message out to you know to call that family of another student involved. Sometimes I might send a message to a whole classroom about something sometimes maybe even to a whole school. It really depends on what the incident is all the circumstances involved how we're protecting the Dignity of everyone involved and problem-solving moving forward.
So. The other thing we wanted to just highlight is as we've been doing this work. We have increased our [00:53:00] staffing pretty significantly in lots of ways that are related. And as we said it's not one position. It's all of us. And so we've also one thing that's not up here is trying to keep our class sizes small.
That's an important part of when a teacher is trying to build relationship being able to have a smaller class size makes a big difference in that and that's not even up here. But some of the ones that are more about social emotional learning or mental health are listed here and you can see we've made a significant increase in licensed school counselors School psychologists School nurses social workers and our special ed instructional coordinators who really provide a lot of the learning around this summon the few sorts of situations.
finally. Almost finally not quite finally. I just we wanted. Highlight a few of the Partnerships and input groups that continue to support us through this work. [00:54:00] We have a couple of our building principals who are part of our inclusive schools leadership team along with classified staff certified staff General Ed teachers Specialists physical.
Students we meet together multiple times a year not quite monthly but multiple times every year to bring forward. What's the vision? What are the structures? What some big picture data like are we disproportionately looking at disproportionate discipline data by racial ethnic groups or by students with disabilities those kinds of things that's part of the school the work of the inclusive schools leadership team.
We have a parent and District collaboration group that has really been huge in moving getting making sure parent input is in on this work. We partner with Columbia Regional programs, which provides some of the very [00:55:00] high quality professional development. It was really nice looking at principal Mangan over here.
We were I think in his first year here of there was a we had a. Game with some teachers and about behavior supports and unpacking this framework. And one of the teachers afterwards came up to me and said so I'm kind of embarrassed to say this but I don't really know anything about autism and I have two kids in my class with autism and can I get some professional learning on that and you know like that that Jim reached out.
We got the schedule the next professional development day. He had folks from Columbia Regional programs out. Just giving you know that 101. What are the best strategies? Is this and really responsively there? We have a know oftentimes drug and alcohol issues are sort of self-medication for other kinds of social emotional or mental health issues.
So we feel that these things are all interconnected. We [00:56:00] through the great support of saskia Dressler from Arts and Technology and our fabulous Anika. Ulsan and Kelly Schmidt. We have a. Partnership with Northwest Family Services, that's doing some on-site drug and alcohol counseling at those three schools.
We recently are super excited about this brand new partnership with Clackamas County DHS where we recognize it's a big barrier for families to get to either Oregon City or out by Clackamas Town Center, especially for some of our families on the further end of Wilsonville. That's a long way, but it for families in West Linn to that.
Really a barrier. So we have a partnership now with DHS and we have a full time when they call Family coach Monica Stone and she's a lovely person and Annika founder and office space at Meridian Creek, but she's out and about meeting with families to just whatever what do families need in terms of services from [00:57:00] the.
She can help get them to that whether it's cash assistance for families food stamps Child Care block grants. Those kinds of things. We're part of the coalition to prevent suicide the Clackamas County Children of incarcerated parents, and we have you're about to have our second annual. West Linn Wilsonville Community Medical and mental health providers luncheon coming up on May 29th.
We last year just said cash. We want to have better Partnerships with folks want them to understand schools. We want to understand them see how we can work better together. We set we or a luncheon and we send out invitations. We didn't know if anyone would show up. People did it was awesome. They showed up.
We formed a lot of great Partnerships. We are it's had a lot of fruit in ways we've worked together. So we have our second annual one coming up and we think it'll be even bigger this year and we cannot end without talking about our partnership with our associations are both [00:58:00] osea and WWE a and I really want to call out Matt Bell.
I believe it's here. Who has been absolutely fabulous in being the co-facilitator with me in bringing together that critical protocol group that Kathy Monroe was talking about before where we have five or six Association members and five or six administrators and we came together. We said, how do we dig into this, you know Behavior thing and understand it better.
Understand what the needs are we've shared a lot of data with each other. We shared some input with each other and then after much much partnership, we came up with a survey and sent that out to all of our Association members and very excited that I think we have about 650 licensed staff and we got 456 responses back on that survey.
So we're pretty excited. We're going to be meeting on Thursday to review that. See what that shows [00:59:00] us about next steps.  And finally David is just going to read this last slide and then we are going to finish.  Leave you with a powerful yet brief Reflection from a parent from our district. My daughter has a boy with autism in her class.
And my instinct after attending her class, the first time was that it could possibly be distracting and stress-inducing for the rest of the children that thought left as quickly as it came. I have seen how the teachers and aides work with these kids and what an amazing gift it is for the rest of the children to learn patience compassion empathy and an understanding that the world is full of people who may be different from them.
I absolutely love that. My daughter comes home with wonderful stories about this boy. By putting these kids together and creating a positive environment to understand each other. It takes away the fear so may have anyone that seems different they will have the confidence to interact with all people be more kind inclusive and advocate for those who may need [01:00:00] it.
This is something I couldn't teach them just by talking about it. You are creating a generation that will be more accepting and understanding and empathetic my parent event of third grader.  So we thank you for your patience and listening to a slightly lengthened presentation here. We hope that you leave this feeling curious about the depth of some of these but having some confidence that we do have a comprehensive approach that.
We have research-based strategies that we're based in that our beliefs. Our own behavior are aligned with our values as a district.  We are not perfect. It's about partnership and it's about continuing to learn together. Thank you so much.